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Apple's Worst Days Are Finally Gone

Written by: Richard Saintvilus05/01/13 - 6:00 AM EDT

Tickers in this article:
AAPL AMZN BBRY MSFT

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Life has proven time and time again that "all good things come to an end." Apple, which has suffered a 45% decline since reaching an all-time high of $705, is no exception.

That said, as an Apple shareholder and an unabashed "fan-boy," I can say (as objectively as I can) that this degree of "over-correction," which suggests the company was spiraling down BlackBerry's path towards irrelevance, was irrational, if not complete nonsense.

Nevertheless, the Street was convinced Apple's run was over, even though Apple had just come off a first quarter where it posted record revenue of $54 billion. So investors were chewing their nails ahead of the second-quarter report in anticipation of what the company was going to say. But it still seems as if the Street applied selective hearing.

Revenue arrived up 11% year over year to $43.6 billion, which was enough to beat the consensus estimate by roughly 2%. It's also worth noting that Apple's revenue came in almost 6% higher than the $41.3 billion that was projected by long-time Apple bull Gene Munster, analyst at Piper Jaffray.

Remarkably, Apple managed to sell about one million more iPhones than expected, arriving up 3% year-over-year, despite increased competition from Samsung's dominant Galaxy line of phones and the improvements made by BlackBerry and Microsoft's. Mac revenue was a bit soft, though. The fact that Mac sales arrived just 7% higher year over year was discouraging.

However, given the overall state of the PC industry, which has fallen prey to tablets, weak Mac sales came as no surprise. Plus, Apple more than made up for this deficit from iPads, up 40% increase in revenue, or 7% higher than Street estimates. While Amazon's Kindle Fire and Microsoft's Surface tablet are worthwhile devices, Apple's iPad still remains the standard and the number one choice among consumers.

Making Sense of Margins

The most popular cited bear argument against Apple, aside from its perceived lack of innovation, continues to be the company's compressing margins. While Apple didn't woo the Street this quarter with spectacular leverage, I don't think the company confirmed there is a problem, either. Bears will still disagree, and that's fine. But let's keep it in perspective.